Instagram carousel API

Publish Instagram carousels through an API or MCP server: the 10-item limit, the 4:5 to 1.91:1 aspect rule, example requests, daily limits, and every error with its fix.

Early access: publishing carousels to Instagram is built and being tested in the REST API, @turboyap/sdk and the @turboyap/mcp server. It opens to early-access users once Turboyap passes Meta App Review. Meanwhile, test mode runs the same requests against a simulated Instagram account.

What an Instagram carousel is

An Instagram carousel is one feed post with up to 10 images that viewers swipe through. The Instagram API builds it from one media container per image plus a carousel container, then publishes the carousel. In Turboyap it's type: "slideshow" sent to an Instagram account.

Turboyap creates the containers, converts every slide to JPEG, keeps all slides at one aspect ratio (Instagram crops every slide to the first one's ratio), waits for Instagram to finish processing, and publishes.

Limits

What Instagram accepts for this post type. Turboyap's planner checks every one of these before a post is scheduled (the same data as platform rules), and each value links to the Instagram documentation it comes from.

Compare with other platforms in the social media API limits tracker.

Example requests

All three do the same thing: upload the media, preview the post with a dry run, then schedule it. The idempotency key makes retries safe: send the same request again with the same key and you get the original post back, not a second one.

Early access: api.turboyap.com isn't public yet, and @turboyap/sdk and @turboyap/mcp aren't on npm yet. These examples show the API as built.

curl

# 1. Upload each image. The body is the raw file; Content-Type is its type.
curl https://api.turboyap.com/v1/media \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $TURBOYAP_API_KEY" \
  -H "Content-Type: image/png" \
  -H "X-Filename: slide-1.png" \
  --data-binary @slide-1.png
# → { "media": { "id": "med_…", "width": 1080, "height": 1920, … }, "deduplicated": false }

# 2. Preview. Remove "dry_run" to create and schedule the post.
curl https://api.turboyap.com/v1/posts \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $TURBOYAP_API_KEY" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{
    "type": "slideshow",
    "media_ids": ["med_…", "med_…", "med_…"],
    "caption": "Five label tricks brands hope you miss. Save this for your next grocery run.",
    "targets": [{ "account_id": "acct_instagram…" }],
    "schedule_at": "2026-10-20T18:00:00-04:00",
    "fit": { "overflow": "truncate", "aspect": "pad" },
    "idempotency_key": "instagram-carousel-2026-10-20",
    "dry_run": true
  }'

TypeScript with @turboyap/sdk

import { readFile } from "node:fs/promises";
import { TurboyapClient } from "@turboyap/sdk";

const ty = new TurboyapClient({ apiKey: process.env.TURBOYAP_API_KEY! });
const account = (await ty.listAccounts()).find((a) => a.platform === "instagram")!;

const media_ids: string[] = [];
for (const file of ["slide-1.png", "slide-2.png", "slide-3.png"]) {
  const { media } = await ty.uploadMedia(await readFile(file), { filename: file, contentType: "image/png" });
  media_ids.push(media.id);
}

const post = {
  type: "slideshow" as const,
  media_ids,
  caption: "Five label tricks brands hope you miss. Save this for your next grocery run.",
  targets: [{ account_id: account.id }],
  schedule_at: "2026-10-20T18:00:00-04:00",
  fit: { overflow: "truncate" as const, aspect: "pad" as const },
  idempotency_key: "instagram-carousel-2026-10-20",
};

// Preview first: every problem comes back with a fix.
const preview = await ty.createPost({ ...post, dry_run: true });
if (!preview.ok) throw new Error(preview.errors.map((e) => `${e.code}: ${e.fix}`).join("\n"));

const { post: created } = await ty.createPost(post);
console.log(created.targets[0]?.status, created.targets[0]?.next_step);

Claude Code (MCP)

Add the Turboyap MCP server once, with an agent key from your workspace:

claude mcp add turboyap -e TURBOYAP_API_KEY=ty_agent_… -- npx -y @turboyap/mcp

Then ask:

Upload the slides in ~/content/labels and schedule them as an Instagram carousel for Thursday noon ET. They're 9:16, so pad them to fit Instagram without cutting text. Dry-run first.

The agent calls list_accounts, get_platform_rules, upload_media, create_post with dry_run: true, applies any fixes, calls create_post again to schedule, and reports each account's next_step from get_post. The same server works in Cursor; see the MCP quickstart.

How publishing works

Instagram has one publishing mode. When the scheduled time arrives, Turboyap creates the media containers and the carousel container, waits for Instagram to finish processing, then publishes. The target moves scheduled → publishing → processing → published, and platform_url links to the live post.

JPEG only; Turboyap converts PNG/WebP automatically.

Instagram crops every carousel image to the first image's aspect ratio, so Turboyap normalizes all slides to one ratio.

Vertical 9:16 slides are outside Instagram's 4:5–1.91:1 range: set fit.aspect to "pad" (keeps all content) or "crop".

Common errors and fixes

Every error has a code, the field that caused it, and a fix an agent can apply without asking you. A request with several problems returns all of them in issues; a dry run returns them without creating anything.

Errors from Instagram itself appear on the target's error with Instagram's own code. Turboyap retries rate limits and temporary failures with backoff, and marks the account for reconnection when Instagram rejects its token.

Approval and audit

• Level 1, review everything (default): a post an agent schedules starts as pending_approval and waits until a human approves it with a human key (POST /v1/posts/:id/approve). Agent keys can't approve.
• Level 3, full autopilot: agent posts schedule directly. Every action is still logged. Level 2, guardrails, is coming soon.
• Posts created by humans schedule directly at any level.
• Edits re-open review: if an agent changes the caption or time of an approved post on a level-1 account, it goes back to pending_approval.
• Dry runs show the outcome: each target's status_on_create tells the agent whether the post will wait for approval.
• Audit log: every create, approval, edit, publish and failure is recorded with whether a human or an agent did it, the key id, and the MCP client name. The kill switch (POST /v1/workspace/pause) stops every publish to Instagram and every other platform at once.

Read more in the autonomy dial.

FAQ

Related

• Instagram image post API
• TikTok slideshow API
• Bluesky multi-image post API (beta)
• Telegram album API (beta)
• Discord multi-image message API (beta)
• Post one slideshow to TikTok and Instagram
• REST API reference
• Platform rules
• Social media API limits tracker

This page as markdown: /api/instagram/carousel.md. Everything for LLMs: /llms.txt.